Minethings, a multiplayer browser game I'm into

Monday, January 22, 2007

The battleground of the will of the American people

The will of the American people is a battleground, and the vast majority of Americans are open turf for the combatants. How many? Bush's approval rating was around 90% at it's high point and now it is around 30%:

So about 60% of the American people are like a willow tree bending in the wind. The military has to start investing some significant resources into psyops on our own people. We have been underestimating the importance of the battle over the minds and hearts of the American people, but our enemies haven't. They have filled the vaccuum we have left.

This doesn't mean that we resort to lying propaganda because if you're in psyops, you know that lies will always end up hurting you more in the long run. What it means is that the military has to get the truth out about what is happening in Iraq and other theatres of operation and maintain credibility by admitting faults and problems but always making sure to show the whole picture which headline news misses by its nature.

One way to inprove psyops on the homefront is to combine secops and psyops. Limitations on soldiers' ability to tell stories from the front should be balanced with the benefits it has on the will of the American people. Again, it shouldn't be used to be biased to give more good news than bad but to give a better picture of the whole situation to maintain credibility.

I hope this isn't a new idea for the military. Because of the increase in media coverage, the battleground that is the will of the American people is as important as the physical battleground soldiers fight and build on. Losing either one means losing both.